Birthday Surprises
by Mouse-size-Dragon
Summary: Sometimes surprise birthday parties are the worst ideas you can have. Kurt discovers that when someone doesn't do something he should really ask why before he tries to fix it.


**Disclaimer: **None of Glee belongs to me; I've just got a lot of imagination (and ADD). And if you can't tell I'm kind of obsessed with Puck, and Kurt to a lesser extent, so if I owned it the whole show would be about them (forget Rachel and Finn, and Dalton- what's that?).

**AN: **None of this is Betaed; I'm the only one who's edited it so sorry for any mistakes.

Sometimes surprise birthday parties are the worst ideas you can have. Kurt discovers that when someone doesn't do something he should really ask why before he tries to fix it.

**Birthday Surprises**

Senior year was coming to an end, the New Directions members had all grown closer, and they'd gotten third at Nationals this year. They didn't really even have that separate football players, and cheerleaders, vs. Glee nerds dynamic anymore. Not only had the Tina/Mike Asian fusion couple helped, but Sam and Mercedes had also stayed a couple throughout the year, and although they never quite worked out together Lauren and Puck made great friends. Actually the weirdest thing was the Mercedes, Kurt, Lauren, and Puck friendship; Lauren and Puck were now best friends and, since Lauren befriended Kurt and Mercedes, Puck ended up hanging out with them as well. Perhaps it was the kid who used to be thrown in the dumpster every morning and his ex-bully acting friendly outside of the club, talking in the halls and hanging out, that really helped cement the club as one big group of friends regardless of their personal dramas.

Whatever it was this was the final year for most of them and the whole club managed to stay on relatively good terms with each other the whole time. Being on such good terms they all agreed to help Kurt, who had the biggest house since Finn and he each had their own rooms as well as the basement being a lounge area with an electronics space, throw a surprise birthday party for Puck. Puck's birthday fell on the last weekend before graduation, that Saturday. Ever since Puck mentioned, months ago when they'd had a get together for Kurt's birthday, that he hadn't celebrated his birthday since he turned nine Kurt had been plotting a surprise party.

Everyone, including Puck, knew it was a 'last hurrah' before graduation and splitting up party but the rest of the guests also knew it was to celebrate Puck's birthday. Kurt had told everyone but Puck that the party started at five. Puck thought it was going to start at seven. To get Puck to come to the party 'early' Kurt was going to drive over to his house at around five and ask him to come over early to help set up, Finn would be supposedly on a date with Rachel, and Kurt would insist he needed Puck to move some furniture around. The plan went off without a hitch until Kurt rang the doorbell to the Puckerman house and was greeted with a tearful Mrs. Puckerman.

"Oh, hello Kurt," she greeted quietly, Lauren, Mercedes and him had all been over a few times after school. "Noah's still at the Temple."

"Do you know when he'll be back? I, um, wanted his help setting up," Kurt said, uncertain as to why Puck would be there since no one was in a coma.

"In time for your party I'm sure, but he's been there since one this time, I think it would be okay to disturb him early this year, if you need to," a few tears spilled over and down her cheeks. "It's the one on Elm Street, just go around back, you'll find them."

So, after a cryptic and depressing (she was _crying_ the whole time) conversation with Puck's mother, Kurt headed off to the Elm Street Temple to find the birthday boy. He parked and after seeing that Puck's truck was in the lot too he hopped out and started around to the back of the building. Although Mrs. Puckerman had said he'd find 'them' the only thing he was seeing was a small graveyard. A graveyard that had someone lying down on one of the graves, someone who looked very familiar. Kurt rushed through the gate and into the cemetery, the closer he got the slower he walked as the more obvious it got that it was indeed Puck lying on the grass at the foot of a grave. Reaching the isle that his friend was in Kurt could see that Puck was actually lying on his back in an empty patch with graves on either side. With his eyes closed, his expression blank and relaxed, and his hands resting peacefully across his stomach he looked like he could be another corpse awaiting burial.

"I'm still not dead yet Ms. Golberg," Puck called without opening his eyes as Kurt's shadow fell across his face.

"While that's very comforting, I'm not Ms. Golberg," Kurt replied. Puck's eyes snapped open and he sat up instantly.

"Damn, I knew mentioning our birthday would come back to bite me in the ass."

"Um, what?" Kurt asked rather inelegantly as he was still lost as to why Puck had spent hours in the cemetery on his birthday.

"This is Eli, my twin," Puck gestured to the gravestone he'd been lying next to. It read Elijah Aaron Puckerman and according to the dates he'd died on his, and Puck's, tenth birthday. Reading his expression Puck nodded, "we were in an accident a few days after we moved to Lima. He died in the ICU at one in the morning the day we turned ten. One of the reasons I've never been a good best friend to Finn; he met Eli first and he doesn't even remember him, he thinks we were the same kid."

"Oh. Well, Finn's never been the brightest," Kurt trailed off.

"He saw me a few days after the funeral and was calling me Eli and asking why I never came over or anything because he'd thought being the same age, both of us with no dads, and right down the street from each other we'd be best friends. I yelled at him about how he didn't know me and my name was Noah Ellis Puckerman and he stared at me with that dumb kicked puppy look. Then he said my name was long and confusing so why didn't I shorten it to Puck, so I did. Because it'd always been Noah and Eli, 'No lie,' we were brothers, best friends, and each others' alibi so I didn't want to be Noah without Eli."

Kurt was looking at him with that 'I'm so touched I might cry on you' look and Puck, trying to lighten the mood again and avoid tears, pulled a picture of the two of them taken possibly a few weeks before the accident out of his wallet and showed it to the other boy. The two boys looked like younger versions of Puck, which one of them was, with thick curly brown hair and matching grins. Both wore brightly colored red and blue shorts and a t-shirt but in opposite colors: one had blue where the other had red. One had his arm over the other's shoulders, a smudge of dirt across his left cheek, and an extra mischievous spark in his gaze, a look that said 'I've hidden something slimy where you'll inconveniently find it later.' The other looked innocent and neat in comparison, until you noticed that he was making bunny ears behind his brother's head and had grass stains on his knees. Aside from what they were doing and wearing they looked like they'd be very, very, hard to tell apart if they didn't want you to know which was which, they gave off a feeling of solidarity, of 'it's us against you, suckers.'

"One of us was always coming up with crazy prank ideas and the other would make the plans to carry them out. We worked together but one of us was the 'good' twin and the other was the real troublemaker; Ma used to tell us 'you'll be such a heartbreaker, and you, you'd better have plans to fix all those hearts you help him break!' Care to guess who was which?" He offered with a smirk.

"Well, I've got no idea which one you are in the picture but I'd say you were the kid who came up with the plans and you were supposed to be fixing those hearts not breaking them," Kurt nodded certain in his choice. "You're much nicer than you pretend to be."

"Wow," Puck raised an eyebrow in shock. "I didn't think you'd guess, but yeah, I used to be the good twin. Until I was nice and gave Eli the window seat and got him killed." They sat in silence after his bitter comment. Kurt wasn't sure how to comfort him, or even if Puck needed comforting, he seemed to have dealt with everything already.

"I'm giving Eli bunny ears," he said quietly just before he took the photo back and slipped it away. "None of us could bear to celebrate after that so I sneak in here each year and spend the day with him, from when he died to sometime in the evening."

"You mean you visit this place every year at one a.m.?" Graveyards were creepy at night, and Puck had been spending his birthdays in one for the last eight years.

"Yeah, a couple times I've gone from midnight to midnight, really spending the whole day with him," Puck shrugged like it wasn't such a big deal and maybe to him it wasn't anymore.

"Do you just lie here?" Kurt carefully sat down next to him.

"No, I tell him everything that's happened since last year; how Ma and our sister are, what I've been up to, how my friends are doing, who my friends are. Anything I can think of, it helps me deal," Puck explained. Thinking of something he smirked at Kurt. "By the way, you're totally sitting on my grave Hummel."

"Oh my, I'm so sorry," Kurt stumbled up and into the walkway at breakneck speed.

"It's cool," Puck laughed as he stood at a much calmer pace. "I'm guessing you searched me out for a reason?"

"Yes, well it doesn't seem like a good idea anymore but we had a surprise birthday party planned for you. I'll text 'Cedes, we'll cancel it, take down the decorations, cover-up the cake," Kurt started rambling as he pulled out his phone. Puck snatched it from him.

"Forget it, I kinda guessed you were planning something. I'm fine with it, but if it had been a complete surprise I might've been, well depressed, but I'd act pissed." Leading the way back to the parking lot he texted Mercedes 'Sorry it took so long, had to search for him, we'll be there soon.' with Kurt's phone. "Now you lead the way and I'll act surprised when we get there. And, y' know, we're leaving soon anyway, so I don't care if you tell everyone where you found me."

"Where are you going after graduation anyways?" Kurt asked as he took his phone back. Puck grinned at him as he hopped into the cab of his truck.

"I'll be seeing you in New York, Hummel," he called out his window just before Kurt closed his car door. "Just not on Broadway, unless I was like, watching you or something."

* * *

><p><strong>AN: <strong>I know a twin whose twin committed suicide. They were identical, until one of them slit her wrists when she was home alone. The saddest part is that the twin who's still alive found her sister like that and she's never been the same. I think she couldn't get over losing her sister like that, add to that the fact that she could have been looking at her own body (being identical and all) and she's been super quiet and depressed for years. The last time we talked she was on meds and seeing a shrink at least once a week.

This isn't the same thing but I just feel that losing a _twin_ is so much more traumatizing than losing just any sibling, for the whole family, those parents have to look at their remaining kid and see what their dead child would have looked like every day. And I love the idea of meeting your long lost twin or doppelganger so I might even have another story where someone has a twin.

So I joined the Peace Corps back in 2010 and have had very spotty Internet since then, I never seem to have a flash drive with my stories (mostly GWA which is actually done) on it when I visit a town or city with Internet, so I'm just posting as I can. Also because of this I've only seen the first half of the second year of Glee, anything that happens after that may or may not be included in any of my fics because I may have started writing it before an episode came out or before I heard of it.


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